Femtocell is an emerging technology targeted for 3G/4G technologies such as a Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), Code Division Multiplex Access (CDMA) systems, WiMax™ systems and Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems. Femtocells access points (AP) are radio access point devices that serve as mini cell tower devices to improve coverage of service to wireless user devices and offload mobile infrastructure of the mobile service provider by utilizing a subscriber's backhaul wide area network connection.
A wireless user device, also called User Equipment (UE), such as a cell phone or Smartphone, connects via the radio access point device to the wireless service provider's network. In a standard 3G system, the UE obtains its timezone information from the mobile switch center (MSC) in the wireless service provider's network. For macro cell towers, the location area code (LAC) included in the over-the-air (OTA) transmission from a macro cell tower can be used to differentiate the timezones and provide the appropriate timezone indicator to the UE. Radio access point devices, however, can be located in different time zones yet connect to the same gateway equipment, which in turn can connect to the same MSC. Consequently, the MSC needs to respond with a different timezone indicator to UE location requests sent via radio access point devices in different timezones.
To accomplish a mechanism for assigning the correct timezone to a UE that is served by a radio access point device, it is necessary to identify the location of the radio access point device and its timezone. Moreover, the assignment of LACs to radio access point devices is dynamic because radio access point devices go on and off the wireless cellular network with new and changing subscriber accounts.